Joanna Krupa gives Terrell Owens the Terrell Owens treatment

By MJD

After making a career of shoving his own quarterbacks into the woodchipper, I sort of hoped that eventually, someone would do the same to Terrell Owens(notes). What I didn't figure was that it would be model Joanna Krupa.

ABC's got this new show called "The Superstars" where a celebrity pairs up with an athlete in a series of athletic competitions. The winner gets ... I don't know, to be on television more, I guess. Last night was the first episode, and Terrell Owens and Joanna Krupa, probably the favorites, were the first couple eliminated.

From there, Joanna turned into Terrell Owens, and she turned Terrell Owens into Jeff Garcia(notes).

Oh, that's fantastic. My favorite part is right at the end when she throws in a forceful little "Shut up." I think I've watched it about 843 times.

Did Owens deserve to be yelled at like a little boy? No, probably not; the poor guy's foot got caught in the net. Tough break. But Jeff Garcia and Donovan McNabb(notes) probably didn't deserve the treatment they got from Terrell Owens, either.

It happened, though. Miss Krupa is probably used to having everything in the world she wants, and probably has a pretty healthy ego of her own. That doesn't make her right, of course, except in the grander, karmic scheme of things.

Maybe, in the end, it'll be good for Owens to experience what it's like to be on the wrong end of a media tirade. Joanna Krupa may have just done Trent Edwards(notes) a huge favor.

Former player charged with killing Iowa coach

By NIGEL DUARA

PARKERSBURG, Iowa (AP)—A 24-year-old former high school football player walked into the school’s weight room Wednesday morning and fatally shot his former coach, before sheriff’s deputies arrested him at a nearby home a short time later, authorities said.

Mark Becker shot Aplington-Parkersburg High School football coach Ed Thomas several times with a handgun after walking into the room at about 8 a.m., authorities said. Thomas was rushed to nearby Waterloo hospital, where he died.

Several students were in the room at the time of the shooting, but none were injured, said Kevin Winker, assistant director of the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation. School was not in session Wednesday.

“The people that were present were not threatened in any way,” Winker said.

Becker is charged with first-degree murder and was being held in Butler County jail.

Winker said Becker was arrested without incident at a home in rural Parkersburg shortly after authorities received a 911 call about the shooting.

He said he couldn’t discuss what Becker’s motive for the slaying might have been, or what Becker might have been up to in the days leading up to the shooting.

“Motive is one of those things we’re looking into,” Winker said.

Winker said Becker used a handgun in the shooting. He did not elaborate.

He said investigators plan on interviewing students who were in the weight room and to look into Becker’s past.

“Mr. Becker’s entire past is being looked at,” Winker said.

The school is in Parkersburg, about 80 miles northeast of Des Moines.

Thomas compiled a career record of 292-84 in 37 seasons as a head coach, 34 of them at Aplington-Parkersburg, and was one of the most well-known high school football coaches in Iowa. He was honored as the NFL High School Coach of the Year in 2005, and four of his former players are in the NFL: Green Bay’s Aaron Kampman, Jacksonville’s Brad Meester, Detroit’s Jared DeVries and Denver’s Casey Wiegmann

Fierce Tehran clashes between police, protesters

TEHRAN, Iran – Police beat protesters and fired tear gas and water cannons at thousands who rallied Saturday in open defiance of Iran's clerical government, sharply escalating the most serious internal conflict since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Witnesses described fierce clashes after some 3,000 protesters, many wearing black, chanted "Death to the dictator!" and "Death to dictatorship!" near Revolution Square in downtown Tehran. Police fired tear gas, water cannons and guns but it was not clear if they were firing live ammunition.

Some protesters appeared to be fighting back, setting fire to militia members' motorcycles, witnesses said. There were no immediate confirmed reports of fatalities and the head of Iran's police said his men had been ordered to act with restraint.

"We acted with leniency but I think from today on, we should resume law and confront more seriously," General Esmaeil Ahmadi Moghadam said on state television. "The events have become exhausting, bothersome and intolerable. I want them to take the police cautions seriously because we will definitely show a serious confrontation against those who violate rules."

Police and militia were blocking protesters from gathering on the main thoroughfare running east from Revolution Square to Freedom Square, the witnesses said.

A massive rally in Freedom Square Monday set off three consecutive days of protests demanding the government cancel and rerun June 12 elections that ended with a declaration of overwhelming victory for hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Reformist presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi says he won and Ahmadinejad stole the election through widespread fraud.

Mousavi has not been seen since a rally Thursday, but late Saturday he repeated his demand for the election to be annulled.

In a letter to Iran's Guardian Council, which investigates voting fraud allegations, Mousavi listed violations that he says are proof that the June 12 vote should be annulled. He said some ballot boxes had been sealed before voting began, thousands of his representatives had been expelled from polling stations and some mobile polling stations had ballot boxes filled with fake ballots.

"The Iranian nation will not believe this unjust and illegal" act, Mousavi said in the letter published on one of his official Web sites.

But Mousavi did not say whether he endorsed ongoing street protests or the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who sternly warned opposition leaders to end rallies or be held responsible for "the bloodshed, the violence and rioting" to come.

Khamenei's statement during Friday prayers effectively closed the door to Mousavi's demand for a new election.

As reports of street clashes became public, Iran's English-language state TV said that a suicide bombing at the shrine of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini about 12 miles (20 kilometers) south of central Tehran had killed one person and wounded eight. The report could not be independently confirmed due to government restrictions on independent reporting.

The channel also confirmed that police had used batons and other non-lethal weapons against what it called unauthorized demonstrations.

Amateur video showed dozens of Iranians running down a street after police fired tear gas at them. Shouts of "Allahu Akbar!" — "God is Great" — could be heard on the video, which could not be independently verified.

Helicopters hovered, ambulances raced through the streets and black smoke rose over the city.

The witnesses told The Associated Press that between 50 and 60 protesters were hospitalized after beatings by police and pro-government militia. People could be seen dragging away comrades bloodied by baton strikes.

Police clashed with protesters around Tehran immediately after the presidential election. Gunfire from a militia compound left at least seven dead, but further force had remained in check until Saturday.

Eyewitnesses said thousands of police and plainclothes militia members filled the streets to prevent rallies. Fire trucks took up positions in Revolution Square and riot police surrounded Tehran University, the site of recent clashes between protesters and security forces, one witness said.

Tehran Province Police Chief Ahmad Reza Radan said that police would "crack down on any gathering or protest rally which are being planned by some people." The head of the State Security Council also reiterated a warning to Mousavi that he would be held responsible if he encouraged protests.

Tehran University, which sits in the heart of downtown Tehran, was cordoned off by police and militia while students inside the university chanted "Death to the dictator!" witnesses said.

Shouts of "Viva Mousavi!" also could be heard. Witnesses said protesters wore black as a symbol of mourning for the dead and the allegedly stolen election, with wristbands in green, the emblem of Mousavi's self-described "Green Wave" movement.

All witnesses spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared government reprisals for speaking with the press. Iranian authorities have placed strict limits on the ability of foreign media to cover recent events, banning reporting from the street and allowing only phone interviews and information from officials sources such as state TV.

"I think the regime has taken an enormous risk in confronting this situation in the manner that they have," said Mehrdad Khonsari, a consultant to the London-based Center for Arab and Iranian Studies.

"Now they'll have to hold their ground and hope that people don't keep coming back. But history has taught us that people in these situations lose their initial sense of fear and become emboldened by brutality," he said.

Mousavi and the two other candidates who ran against Ahmadinejad had been invited to meet with Iran's Guardian Council, an unelected body of 12 clerics and Islamic law experts close to Khamenei that oversees elections. Its spokesman told state TV that Mousavi and the reformist candidate Mahdi Karroubi did not attend.

The council has said it was prepared to conduct a limited recount of ballots at sites where candidates claim irregularities but Mousavi's supporters did not withdraw his demands for a new election.

Both houses of the U.S. Congress approved a resolution on Friday condemning "the ongoing violence" by the Iranian government and its suppression of the Internet and cell phones.

The government has blocked Web sites such as BBC Farsi, Facebook, Twitter and several pro-Mousavi sites that are conduits for Iranians to tell the world about protests and violence.

Text messaging has not been working normally for many days, and cell phone service in Tehran is frequently down.

In an interview taped Friday with CBS, Obama said he is very concerned by the "tenor and tone" of Khamenei's comments. He also said that how Iran's leaders "approach and deal with people who are, through peaceful means, trying to be heard" will signal "what Iran is and is not."

A spokesman for Mousavi said Friday the opposition leader was not under arrest but was not allowed to speak to journalists or stand at a microphone at rallies. Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf told the AP from Paris it was even becoming difficult to reach people close to Mousavi. He said he had not heard from Mousavi's camp since Khamenei's address

Inside the Obama White House

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WHITE CEILING WATCH

By BETTY PLEASANT, Contributing Editor

WHITE CEILING WATCH — The recent kidnapping by Somali pirates and the rescue of the Maersk Alabama ship Capt. Richard Phillips is so well known that the heroic episode will surely be recorded in American history. But there’s somebody else who needs to be remembered: The commander of the ship that saved Phillips. That would be Rear Admiral Michelle Howard, an African-American woman. Adm. Howard, who holds a master’s degree in military science arts and sciences from the Army’s Command and General Staff College, had received the assignment of leading the U.S. Navy’s counter-piracy task force just three days before the Maersk Alabama was attacked by Somali pirates.

Howard was the first in her 1992 U.S. Naval Academy class to reach the rank of admiral in 1999 and the first Black woman to command a Navy ship — the USS Rushmore. Adm. Howard’s task force operates with U.S. warships deployed to the Eastern Africa area as well as with those sent from allied nations. Before her present assignment, she was the senior military assistant to the secretary of the Navy. Remember the name: Adm. Michelle Howard.

Bon Jovi among those inducted in songwriters hall

NEW YORK – Jon Bon Jovi considers writing classic songs as a way of being remembered throughout time.

"It's the closest thing to immortality as we're ever gonna see here," he said.

There may be another way: the Songwriters Hall of Fame. And on Thursday night, the New Jersey rocker and his writing partner, Richie Sambora, joined Crosby, Stills & Nash for one of music's top honors.

Also honored at the induction ceremony, which represented the Songwriters Hall's 40th anniversary, was Jason Mraz, who was given the Hal David Starlight Award honoring a younger artist's promise. Mraz performed his hit single "I'm Yours" to the delight of the crowd of his more established peers.

"I believe in 20 years, or whatever, (he) is going to be in the Songwriters Hall of Fame," Rob Thomas said before the ceremony.

Other performers ranged from James Taylor to the cast of the recently revived "Hair," whose composers were also inducted.

Kara DioGuardi, the "American Idol" judge and songwriter, said the Songwriters Hall is important because composers still don't get enough recognition.

"A lot of the public still considers artists to be the only people that write their songs. They don't even think there could be another songwriter. They just think whoever is singing it, wrote it," she said.

Crosby, Stills & Nash, among the acts who wrote their own material, were inducted by singer-songwriter Taylor, who performed a medley of their hits.

"They speak for a generation. I know that sounds cliche, but it's really true," he said before the ceremony.

Clint Black honored the British songwriting team of Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway with their classic "Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress." The pair penned many hits, including "You've Got Your Troubles," "My Baby Loves Lovin'" and "Here Comes That Rainy Day Feeling Again." They also wrote the Coca-Cola jingle "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing."

Chris Daughtry of the multiplatinum band Daughtry inducted Bon Jovi and Sambora Afterward, Bon Jovi, with Sambora on a double-neck guitar, performed "Wanted: Dead or Alive," one of Bon Jovi's many signature hits.

Earlier in the evening, Daughtry talked about the impact Bon Jovi had on his band.

"They're a huge influence on our career as songwriters, as performers, as people," he said.

Broadway was represented with two inductions: Stephen Schwartz, composer of the hit "Wicked," was inducted by Five for Fighting's John Ondrasik. Schwartz then performed a solo version of "Defying Gravity," the dynamic duet sung by the show's witches Elphaba and Glinda. It took on a much different demeanor with its creator's solitary voice.

The last induction of the evening went to Galt MacDermot, James Rado and Gerome Ragni, writers of the musical "Hair."

Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr., whose group, The Fifth Dimension, took "Aquarius/Let the Sun Shine In" to the top of the charts in 1969, were joined on stage by the current Broadway cast for a finale that brought the ceremony's approximately 1,000 guests to their feet

Jury rules against Minn. woman in download case

MINNEAPOLIS – A replay of the nation's only file-sharing case to go to trial has ended with the same result — a Minnesota woman was found to have violated music copyrights and must pay huge damages to the recording industry.

A federal jury ruled Thursday that Jammie Thomas-Rasset willfully violated the copyrights on 24 songs, and awarded recording companies $1.92 million, or $80,000 per song.

Thomas-Rasset's second trial actually turned out worse for her. When a different federal jury heard her case in 2007, it hit Thomas-Rasset with a $222,000 judgment.

The new trial was ordered after the judge in the case decided he had erred in giving jury instructions.

Thomas-Rasset sat glumly with her chin in hand as she heard the jury's finding of willful infringement, which increased the potential penalty. She raised her eyebrows in surprise when the jury's penalty of $80,000 per song was read.

Outside the courtroom, she called the $1.92 million figure "kind of ridiculous" but expressed resignation over the decision.

"There's no way they're ever going to get that," said Thomas-Rasset, a 32-year-old mother of four from the central Minnesota city of Brainerd. "I'm a mom, limited means, so I'm not going to worry about it now."

Her attorney, Kiwi Camara, said he was surprised by the size of the judgment. He said it suggested that jurors didn't believe Thomas-Rasset's denials of illegal file-sharing, and that they were angry with her.

Camara said he and his client hadn't decided whether to appeal or pursue the Recording Industry Association of America's settlement overtures.

Cara Duckworth, a spokeswoman for the RIAA, said the industry remains willing to settle. She refused to name a figure, but acknowledged Thomas-Rasset had been given the chance to settle for $3,000 to $5,000 earlier in the case.

"Since Day One we have been willing to settle this case and we remain willing to do so," Duckworth said.

In closing arguments earlier Thursday, attorneys for both sides disputed what the evidence showed.

An attorney for the recording industry, Tim Reynolds, said the "greater weight of the evidence" showed that Thomas-Rasset was responsible for the illegal file-sharing that took place on her computer. He urged jurors to hold her accountable to deter others from a practice he said has significantly harmed the people who bring music to everyone.

Defense attorney Joe Sibley said the music companies failed to prove allegations that Thomas-Rasset gave away songs by Gloria Estefan, Sheryl Crow, Green Day, Journey and others.

"Only Jammie Thomas's computer was linked to illegal file-sharing on Kazaa," Sibley said. "They couldn't put a face behind the computer."

Sibley urged jurors not to ruin Thomas-Rasset's life with a debt she could never pay. Under federal law, the jury could have awarded up to $150,000 per song.

U.S. District Judge Michael Davis, who heard the first lawsuit in 2007, ordered up a new trial after deciding he had erred in instructions to the jurors. The first time, he said the companies didn't have to prove anyone downloaded the copyrighted songs she allegedly made available. Davis later concluded the law requires that actual distribution be shown.

His jury instructions this time framed the issues somewhat differently. He didn't explicitly define distribution but said the acts of downloading copyrighted sound recordings or distributing them to other users on peer-to-peer networks like Kazaa, without a license from the owners, are copyright violations.

This case was the only one of more than 30,000 similar lawsuits to make it all the way to trial. The vast majority of people targeted by the music industry had settled for about $3,500 each. The recording industry has said it stopped filing such lawsuits last August and is instead now working with Internet service providers to fight the worst offenders.

In testimony this week, Thomas-Rasset denied she shared any songs. On Wednesday, the self-described "huge music fan" raised the possibility for the first time in the long-running case that her children or ex-husband might have done it. The defense did not provide any evidence, though, that any of them had shared the files.

The recording companies accused Thomas-Rasset of offering 1,700 songs on Kazaa as of February 2005, before the company became a legal music subscription service following a settlement with entertainment companies. For simplicity's sake the music industry tried to prove only 24 infringements.

Reynolds argued Thursday that the evidence clearly pointed to Thomas-Rasset as the person who made the songs available on Kazaa under the screen name "tereastarr." It's the same nickname she acknowledged having used for years for her e-mail and several other computer accounts, including her MySpace page.

Reynolds said the copyright security company MediaSentry traced the files offered by "tereastarr" on Kazaa to Thomas-Rasset's Internet Protocol address — the online equivalent of a street address — and to her modem.

He said MediaSentry downloaded a sample of them from the shared directory on her computer. That's an important point, given Davis' new instructions to jurors.

Although the plaintiffs weren't able to prove that anyone but MediaSentry downloaded songs off her computer because Kazaa kept no such records, Reynolds told the jury it's only logical that many users had downloaded songs offered through her computer because that's what Kazaa was there for.

Sibley argued it would have made no sense for Thomas-Rasset to use the name "tereastarr" to do anything illegal, given that she had used it widely for several years.

He also portrayed the defendant as one of the few people brave enough to stand up to the recording industry, and he warned jurors that they could also find themselves accused on the basis of weak evidence if their computers are ever linked to illegal file-sharing.

"They are going to come at you like they came at 'tereastarr,'" he said.

Steve Marks, executive vice president and general counsel of the Recording Industry Association of America, estimated earlier this week that only a few hundred of the lawsuits remain unresolved and that fewer than 10 defendants were actively fighting them.

The companies that sued Thomas-Rasset are subsidiaries of all four major recording companies, Warner Music Group Corp., Vivendi SA's Universal Music Group, EMI Group PLC and Sony Corp.'s Sony Music Entertainment.

The recording industry has blamed online piracy for declines in music sales, although other factors include the rise of legal music sales online, which emphasize buying individual tracks rather than full albums.

Senate Apologizes For Slavery

All Things Considered, June 18, 2009 · The U.S. Senate apologized Thursday for slavery and for the segregationist Jim Crow laws, 144 years after the Civil War and 45 years after passing the Civil Rights Act.

The action came in a nonbinding resolution adopted unanimously by voice vote.

The Senate chamber was nearly empty as Iowa Democrat Tom Harkin rose to call for a measure that he said was long overdue for the descendants of 4 million blacks who were enslaved in the U.S.

"A national apology by the representative body of the people is a necessary collective response to a past collective injustice," Harkin said. "So, it is both appropriate and imperative that Congress fulfill its moral obligation and officially apologize for slavery and Jim Crow laws."

The resolution states the congressional apology is made to African-Americans on behalf of the people of the United States for "the wrongs committed against them and their ancestors." That is followed, however, by a disclaimer that says nothing in the resolution authorizes any claim against the United States.

Kansas Republican Sam Brownback, who co-sponsored the measure, says that disclaimer was necessary to win the support of senators who feared the apology could be used by African-Americans seeking reparations.

"It was a difficult negotiation," he says. "We had to get the reparation issue right."

Last year, the House passed a similar resolution, but without the reparations disclaimer.

New York Democratic Rep. Gregory Meeks, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, says he isn't sure he supports the Senate's reparations disclaimer.

"If it ... can be construed to mean that ... it rules out [reparations], then that's a problem," Meeks says.

Tennessee Democrat Steve Cohen, who sponsored last year's House resolution, says he hopes the House passes the Senate's apology soon, but he wants it done by voice vote.

"This should be a congenial, kumbaya moment," he says. "A roll call could expose some fissures in what should be a cohesive spirit of apology and rectitude and more perfect union."